A CHANT OF MYSTICS 


PS 

3535 

.16505 

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AND OTHER POEMS 

BY 


AMEEN RIHANI 


























































































































































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A CHANT OF MYSTICS AND OTHER POEMS 


4 


BY THE SAME AUTHOR 


The Luzumiyat, a Translation of Quatrains from the 
Work of the Arab Poet-Philosopher, Abu’l-Ala 

Prose 

The Book of K ha lid 
The Path of Vision. 

The Descent of Bolshevism. 














A Chant of Mystics 

and Other Poems 


By 

AMEEN RIHANI 


NEW YORK 

JAMES T. WHITE & CO. 

IQ3I 



COPYRIGHTED 1921 BY 
JAMES T. WHITE & CO. 

FEB -9 1921 
2)CI, A608540 

I 


^ .rv 




For the privilege of reprinting various 
poems in this volume, grateful acknowledge¬ 
ment is made to the Publishers of The Atlan¬ 
tic Monthly, The Bookman, Asia, Poet-Lore, 
Harper's Magazine , The Phoenix, and other 
publications. 





TO MY BROTHER 
JOSEPH 


CONTENTS 


THE TOWERS AND THE NIGHT.15 

THE END AND THE BEGINNING.l6 

THE CATACLYSM .17 

REFLECTIONS .19 

THE SONG OF SIVA .20 

THE FRUITS OF DEATH .21 

CONSTANTINOPLE .22 

ANDALUSIA .23 

IN THE PALM GROVES OF MEMPHIS.27 

PRAYER IN THE DESERT .33 

WATER AND FLOWERS.34 

THE SONG OF RAIN. . . . 35 

THE HOUSE OF NIGHT.37 

AFTER READING KING LEAR .40 

THE WANDERER .41 

LEBANUS . 43 

THE PAGAN .48 

THE LOST DISCIPLE ..50 

FROM THE ARABIC .5^ 

SHE WENT OUT SINGING .53 

HANEM .54 

O FREEDOM .5^ 

THE ROAD OF MAKE-BELIEVE.58 

RENUNCIATION .60 


























CONTENTS —Continued 


A SUFI SONG.6l 

THE TWO BROTHERS .62 

GOD OF THE DISTANCES, HEAR US.64 

BADRUDDIN .68 

THE SUFI ...71 

THE FUGITIVE .73 

A CHANT OF MYSTICS .78 









A CHANT OF MYSTICS AND OTHER POEMS 





THE TOWERS AND THE NIGHT 


Over the White Way’s flood of light, 

Over its sea of fiery flowers, 

Arose the voice of the ancient Night 
And the youthful Towers: 

“O Night of nations passed,” the Towers said, 
“One day stood high your monuments, but now 
Your highest pyramid must lift its head 
To see the lights that crown our City’s brow.” 

“But man,” replied the Night, “shall crown the stars 
With flowers of thought divine, 

And write his name upon a monument 
Greater than yours and mine.” 


15 


THE END AND THE BEGINNING 


The deed is done, O Kings: the blood is shed: 

The sword is broken:—broken, too, the Cross. 

But she, the mother eternal of the dead, 

Though sorrow-laden, smiles at the loss. 

You go down grimed with the blood and smoke of 
wars; 

Your armies scattered and your banners furled; 

She comes down covered with the dust of stars, 

And gives her life again to build the world. 


16 


THE CATACLYSM 


Even through the City of the Dead she passed, 

Her sack of Horror’s harvest to refill; 

And lo, into the untilled world she cast, 

With a million hands, the black seeds of her will. 
But in the bone-strewn waste I saw a snail 
Crawling out of the socket of a skull, 

Exultant still;— 

Rising from the universal bane 
To thank the rain. 

And in the thorny flanks of the riven tomb, 

Gorged yesteryear with the fruits of fear and doubt 
The nations bear when their sinews run out, 

I saw the crocus weave her tender bloom 
Into the ivy’s tangled hair, 

While struggling out of the gloom 
To praise the air. 

The Cataclysm, passing to her goal. 

Turned inside out the pockets of the world, 

Not sparing even the altar of the soul, 

Which at the cradle of the soul she hurled. 

But when at last she fell 
Across the sill of hell, 


17 


I saw in her incalculable toll 
A butterfly, 

Winging out of the riddled emblem of God 
Toward the sky;— 

Rising with the Faith re-won 
To serenade the sun. 


18 


REFLECTIONS 


I walked along the countryside 
At eventide, 

And everywhere 
The road was fair 

With moons of water here and there, 

Into whose heart the grasses spied. 

And suddenly upon them shone 
The light of the City’s eye, 

Reflected from a buib on high. 

Which made them and their shadow one. 
Nay, made each moon 
A mirror seem 
To serve the dream 

Of tender blades in bending grace a-swoon. 

I walked into the night, 

And every abode 

Beyond the dark, deserted road 

Was a prattle of light. 

And I thought of the Eye Unseen 
Which sheds its charitable sheen, 

Not on our goal. 

But on the by-ways of the Soul. 


19 


THE SONG OF SIVA 


’T is Night; all the Sirens are silent, 

All the Vultures asleep; 

And the horns of the Tempest are stirring 
Under the Deep; 

T is Night; all the snow-burdened Mountains 
Dream of the Sea, 

And down in the Wadi the River 
Is calling to me. 

'T is Night; all the Caves of the Spirit 
Shake with desire, 

And the Orient Heaven ’s essaying 
Its lances of fire; 

They hear, in the stillness that covers 
The land and the sea, 

The River, in the heart of the Wadi, 

Calling to me. 

’T is night, but a night of great joyance, 

A night of unrest;— 

The night of the birth of the spirit 
Of the East and the West; 

And the Caves and the Mountains are dancing 
On the Foam of the Sea, 

For the River inundant is calling. 

Calling to me. 


20 


THE FRUITS OF DEATH 


Said the folded Leaves upon the Heath 
To the opening Leaves upon the Tree: 
“Soon will the Warders of the Storm 
Bring us to our Mother-Sea, 

Even as they opened yesternight 
Our prison doors of Destiny: 

We envy not the Birds now nor the Dew; 

To them we leave the Forest and to you.” 

The infant Leaves thus made reply: 

“But we rejoice that we are here; 

We stand in the cerulean Gate 
Of Life to crown the dying Year. 

Him who emancipates we love, 

He who enchains is also dear: 

You are the Flowers of the Storm, and we, 
We are the Fruits of Death upon Life’s tree. 


21 


CONSTANTINOPLE 


When Othman’s sword, as Paleologue’s, is broken 
And Othman’s gods are smitten to the dust, 

And naught remains, not even a rusty token 
Of their hierarchal cruelty and lust;— 

When church and mosque and synagogue shall be, 
Despite the bigot’s cry, the zealot’s .prayer, 
Unbounded in their bounties all and free 
In every heritage divine to share;— 

When thou shalt rise, rejoicing in thy loss, 

Upon the ruins of a state nefast 
To reconcile the Crescent and the Cross 
And wash thy hands of thine unholy past;— 

When with the faith new-born of East and West, 
Which spans the azure heights of man’s desire, 

The spirit of thy people, long oppressed, 

Is all a-glow with its undying fire;— 

When thou thyself, Byzantium, shalt stand 
In the minaret of Freedom and thy voice, 

Rising above the muazzens in the land, 

Bids all the seekers of the light rejoice;— 

When in thy heart the flame of freedom sings, 

And in thy hand the torch of freedom glows, 

And in thy word the sword of freedom rings, 

And in thy deed the seed of freedom grows,— 

Then shall we call thee Mistress of the Morn, 

Bride of the Straits, Queen of the Golden Horn. 


22 


. ANDALUSIA 


I 

ALCAZAR 

There was a rhapsody in all her moods, 

A child-like grace, a passion unrestrained; 

Her throne, which bard and saki shared, was stained 
With virgin wine as with the blood of feuds; 

And in her tyric-woven interludes, 

Epitomizing destiny and time, 

Her spirit, hid in opalescent rhyme. 

The shades of Melancholy still eludes. 

Where’er she trod, the rose and bulbul meet; 

Where’er she revelled, gardens ever blow; 
Where’er she danced, the henna of her feet 
Yet lends a lustre to the poppy’s glow;— 

Arabia, dark-eyed, light-hearted, fair, 

Is but a flower in Andalusia’s hair. 


23 


II 


ALHAMBRA 

Gods of, the silence, still remembering 
The dying echoes of her lute, bemoan, 

In canticles of golden monotone, 

Her Orient splendor too soon vanishing; 

And while lions guard her courts, grey eagles wing 
Around her turqoise domes, and seedlings blown 
From distant lands to her hushed fountains cling, 
Yea, and the sun himself sits in her throne. 

Time, once her vassal, lingers near the streams 
That woo the shadows of her crumbling walls, 
And, musing of Alhambra’s glory, dreams 
Of Elegance and Power in Myrtle Halls;— 
Arabia, once counted of the strong, 

Is but a sigh in Andalusia’s song. 


24 


Ill 


THE MOSQUE 

In the bewildering grove of colonnades, 

Once brilliant with a flood of saffron light, 

Poured from ten thousand lanterns day and night, 
Her memory, like spikenard in the glades 
Of distant Ind or Yemen, never fades; 

And her devotion, though the ages blight 
The mystic bloom of her divine delight, 

Still casts on alien altars longing shades. 

But through the mihrabs which the humble hand 
Of genius wrought, o’er marbles hollowed deep 
By knees that only Piety could command, 

I see Oblivion coming forth to reap;— 

Arabia, in Allah’s chaplet strung, 

Is but a word on Andalusia’s tongue. 


25 


IV 


AL-ZAHRA 

Not with the Orient glamor of her pleasures, 
Nor with fond rhapsodies of prayer or song 
Could she her sovereign reign a day prolong; 
Not in the things of beauty that man measures 
By the variable humor of his leisures, 

Or by the credibilities that change 
From faith to fantasy to rumor strange, 

Was she the mistress of immortal treasures. 

But when the holy shrine Europa sought, 
Herself of sin and witchcraft to assoil, 

The sovereigns of Al-Zahra maxims wrought 
And Averroes burned his midnight oil;— 
Arabia, the bearer of the light, 

Still sparkles in the diadem of Night. 


26 


IN THE PALM GROVES OF MEMPHIS 


The Khamsin 11 comes robed in the Lybian sands, 
Veiled in the haze of June, 

Armed with Sahara's serpent-wreathed brands, 

Shod with the sun and moon; 

Swift winging in a cycloramic flame,— 

Of Typhon born, unseeing and untame,— 

She comes her reign of terror to proclaim, 

While crowning day and night with all the blazonry 
of tropic noon. 

She claps her iridescent wings, and lo! 

The rolling heat, 

Tremulous, reverberant, a-glow, 

Sibilant, fleet, 

Sweeps over the land with unabating ire, 

Devouring Spring’s heritage entire, 

Setting the very pyramids a-fire, 

Engulfing even the turtle’s shelter and the turtle¬ 
dove’s retreat. 


a A drv wind from the Sahara that prevails in Egypt 
about fifty days. Hence its name—Khamsin. 

27 




Alas! where are the roses which the prime 
Of summer share 

With the sesame, the myrtle and the thyme 
In meadow's fair? 

Where is the sacred lotus and the bloom 

Of cumin and mimosa, whose perfume 

Once filled the shrine of Isis and her tomb? 

Where is the pomegranate flower that shone in 
Cleopatra’s hair? 

Where is the riant beauty of the land 
Of mystic runes 

That decorates its shimmering robes of sand 
With emerald moons ? 

Where are the emerald shelters, desert-bound, 

That with the prayer of caravans resound? 

Where is the desert trail, the watering ground 

That murmurs low of lost oases amidst the fast 
dissolving dunes? 

Where is the caravan that yesternight, 

To the merry sound 

Of bells, set out of the city of delight 
To Nubia bound? 

Where is the Nubian caravan that late 

Passed heavy-laden through Denderah’s gate, 

Speeding to reach the city for the fete, 

When gold and silver freely flow, when Allah’s 
bounties abound ? 


2 8 


Where is the crested lark, the golden thrush 
Of the sacred grove, 

Which made the sensitive accacia blush 
And bloom with love ? 

Where has the bearded bustard fallen? where 
Is Ibis, once the pet of Hermes fair, 

Nursing his purple wings and his despair? 

Where is the red flamingo hiding, where’s the house 
of the turtle-dove? 

Across the welkin, like a shadow cast 
Upon a cloud, but one 

Undaunted dips his black wings in the blast 
And rears anon 

His form against the rushing winds; alone 
The vulture hovers around the flame-draped throne 
Of Death, and over the palms that rock and moan, 
Peering through the desolation, staring at the 
laughing sun. 

And Khamsin, in her chariot of fire, 

Upon which clings 
The moult of her unsatiable desire, 

Delirious sings, 

And shakes the harvest from her tangled hair— 

The sesame seeds, the grasses sere, the tare, 

The golden tassels which the rushes wear, 

The purple feathers of the ibis and the swallow’s 
shrivelled wings. 


29 


She shakes her booty from her sapphire tresses 
In gleeful guile, 

As she in passing savagely caresses 
The crouching Nile; 

While everywhere, within her sight or call. 

Along its banks or in its rushes tall, 

All things are swooning in her leaden thrall,— 

Yea, prostrate is the salamander, prostrate is the 
crocodile. 

And when at intervals her madness takes 
A sudden turn, 

A lull ensues and over Egypt breaks 
The sacred urn 

Of silence; while to quench her ancient thirst, 

Which licked up every running stream and cursed 
Every pool in cave or hollow nursed, 

She plunges deep into the Nile and wonders why his 
waters burn. 

And wonders too when in the winnowed sands. 

Out of the gloom 
Of labyrinthine avenues and lands 
Of mystic bloom, 

Arise the scents of blossoms that have known 
Ten thousand Khamsins, and were often blown 
To dust ere Menes sat upon his throne— 

The blossoms of the teeming depths that float above 
the crest of doom. 

30 


Yea, and in the scattered dust of Ptah, 

The flawless gleam 

That once shone in the fane of Amen-Ra 
Would fain redeem 
From darknesses of immemorial time, 

Which swallowed Thebes and Memphis in their prime, 
The symbol of a heritage sublime, 

And light again the sacred temple of the world’s 
eternal dream. 

For though the earth itself should perish in 
A flaming pyre, 

And the wasting sun should like a spider spin 
His cobwebs of fire, 

Yet in the serdabs under Khamsin’s feet, 

Around the blue of Osiris’s judgment seat, 

Is this, which glyphs vermilion repeat:— 

The sun of thought, of faith, of God shall never 
expire, shall never expire. 

Albeit, in a mocking gust she veers 
Into the gloom 

That knows nor time nor sun, nor ever hears 
The voice of Doom; 

And, rifling the bejewelled gods, she drops 
The veil of splendor from her howdah’s tops 
And rocks in state from Karnak to Cheops 
To tramp the dust of Pharoah’s pride, to smite the 
phantom of his tomb. 


But mocking Khamsin, when her mood is spent, 

Lulls the morn 

In luscious breezes swooning with the scent 
Of love reborn;— 

Carressing winds! the tree senescent grows 

In you as young as fruitful, and the rose 

Upon the bistre lips of Ramesis blows, 

Whispering of things immortal to the wandering 
seed and the reed forlorn. 

She passes in phantasmagoric waves 
Over shifting dunes, 

Through shattered orbs, beyond the barren caves 
Of mouldering moons, 

While the antique youth the Sun, as young to-day 

As when the cricket first essayed her lay, 

Across the flood of Nilus makes his way, 

And with him weaves for Egypt wondrous summer 
garlands and galloons. 

f ... ... ... 

And lo, the Khamsin of the world, in flames 
Of crimson hue 

And clouds of vitriolic dust, proclaims 
The era new; 

But through the storm a spirit wings his flight 

Across the phosphorescent gulfs of night. 

And this, upon the rising sun, doth write:— 

God liveth, yea, God liveth still and man shall 
nothing rue. 


32 


PRAYER IN THE DESERT 


O Lord of Bounties, melt thy heaven’s breath. 
Which spreads its gold around the head of Death,— 
Which, while it smiles, devours all living things, 
Giving to Desolation wondrous wings: 

Lest in the waste Arabia’s star should wane, 

A little rain, Allah, a little rain. 

Thou Bountiful, thy Sun is weaving fast 

The shroud of Earth now in the sand-storm cast; 

Earth can not weep,—the well of faith is run,— 

Its rivers and its desert sands are one: 

O thou Bestower, once more sustain 

Thy sun-crowned Daughter with a little rain. 

Quiet this rising phantom-haunted sea 
Of sands; the Faithful from its fury free; 

Enchain the monsters of the dire simoom,— 

Let not the desert be thy children’s tomb. 

Thou Merciful, assist us to attain 
Our goal,—a little rain, a little rain! 

Arabia’s thousand wounds to thee appeal, 

And with our lips its gaping wounds we seal; 
Prostrate upon the sands we lift our hearts, 

Pierced in thy presence by thy flaming darts. 

Thy children, Allah, in the throes of pain. 

Pray for a little rain, a little rain! 


33 


WATER AND FLOWERS 

Here are flowers, O my Beloved, 

Here are flowers; 

Let us lay our hearts today 
Among - the flowers; 

Let us not be led astray 
By the mirage far away; 

Here is verdure, and in verdure 
Love embowers. 

Here are springs, O my beloved. 

Here are springs; 

Let us rest and build a nest 
Near the springs; 

Let us cease our weary quest 
For the mountains of the blest; 

Here is water, and in water 
Blessing sings. 


34 


TH£ SONG OF RAIN 


Allah is merciful, Allah is kind, 

His heart, in the tears of the earth, is enshrined; 
He chains the desire 
Of whirlwind and fire :— 

The Drought, the Simoon and their forces entire, 
In the fast spreading shades of his pity, suspire;— 
It rains, it rains. 

Allah is gracious, Allah is sweet, 

The desert is flowering under his feet; 

E’en the fires he fanned, 

And the mountains they spanned, 

And the caverns that groan under burdens of sand 
Are dazed with the bounties that flow from his hand 
It rains, it rains! 

Allah ’s all-seeing, Allah is wise, 

The palm from the stone to praise him shall rise; 
The deer in the dale, 

The plant in the shale, 

The bird in the nest, and the gull in the gale 
Are joyously chanting, Hail, Allah, hail! 

It rains, it rains! 


Allah is mighty, Allah is great, 

His hands all things resuscitate; 

He burns the shroud, 

He shakes the cloud, 

And the dead of the earth with new life are endowed,— 
The bones of the earth are joyous and proud;— 

It rains, it rains! 


36 


THE HOUSE OF NIGHT 


Her sable robes the gloaming trails 
From golden strand to purple height, 
And softly, over the wealds and dales, 
Into the vacant House of Night. 

But lo, where first her footsteps mark 
The sunset’s last extinguished pyre,— 
Above the hills,—a saffron spark, 

A gleam of unconjectured fire. 

Between the foliaged zone and sky, 
Where sentries of the forest stand, 

It peeps and flits—a firefly; 

It soars and glows—a firebrand. 

A sacred flame from hemlock shades, 
Rising like a mystic sign 
Above the silence of the glades 
Into the solitudes divine. 

A sign perchance from those who pass 
To those who follow in the gloom, 
Dancing round a moulten mass 
Above the grudging gulfs of doom. 

37 


A new-born world, though years untold 
Have fed the forge that gave it breath, 

Where Life still casts of beaten gold 
Cressets for the shrine of Death. 

A dying world, though like a gem 
Of sapphire hues in nacre bright, 

Dropt from the zone or diadem 
Of the immortal queen of night. 

A world! From depths to heights as dark 
It leaps anon into the dance 

And whirls away—’t is but a spark 

From the anvil of the God of Chance, 

But Faith and Fancy often mar 
The mystery of things divine; 

For that which is a rolling star 
Was fluttering neath a lonely pine. 

And lo, another orb doth roll 

Above the groves where once it trod; 

And still another seeks its goal 
In the infinities of God. 

From where the eagle marks his flight, 
Across the void that earth-bound seems, 

They twinkle forth, a circle of light, 
Around the Gloaming’s couch of dreams. 
38 


And thus they first themselves disguise 
As glow worms in the gathering gloom, 

And suddenly refulgent rise 

O’er the abysmal tracks of doom. 

For aeons thus, from hill to sea, 

Athwart the grudging gulfs they glow; 

And waning tell of the worlds that be 
And the ghosts of worlds of long ago. 

For aeons thus, their torches high, 

The gods unseen— : as when the light 

Of day conceals the starry sky— 
Illuminate the House of Night. 


39 


AFTER READING KING LEAR 


Is ’t strange that in the cycle of his woes, 

Which shakes his cloud-embosomed peak of years 
And shatters the very fountain of his tears, 

He seeks the friendly path of winds and snows? 

When Villany forgiven more villanous grows, 

And Treason in his robes herself attires, 

And Love beneath Adultery’s sheet expires, 

Is ’t strange that mating with the Storm he goes? 

Father and King! in sooth, they know thee well— 
The Whirlwind and the Forest and the Night; 

But we who in the obscure shelters dwell 
Know better of thy sorrow than thy might. 

Father and King! thy heritage is vast; 

Wherever children be, its seeds are cast. 


40 


THE WANDERER 


I wander among the hills of alien lands 
Where Nature her prerogative resigns 
To Man; where Comfort in her shack reclines 
And all the arts and sciences commands. 

But in my soul 

The eastern billows roll— 

I hear the voices of my native strands. 

My lingering eyes, a lonely hemlock fills 
With grace and splendor rising manifold; 

Beneath her boughs the maples spread their gold 
And at her feet, the silver of the rills. 

But in my heart 
A peasant void of art 
Echoes the voices of my native hills. 

On every height a studied art confines 
All human joy in social pulchritude; 

The boxwood frowns where beckoning birches stood. 
And where the thrushes carolled Fashion dines. 

But through the spreading cheer 
The shepherd’s reed I hear 
Beneath my Lebanon terebinths and pines. 


4i 


And though no voices here are heard of toil, 
Nor accents least of sorrow, nor the din 

Of multitudes, nor even at the Inn 
The City is permitted aught to spoil, 

Yet in my breast, 

A shack at best, 

Laments the mother of my native soil. 

Even where the sumptuous solitudes deny 
A shelter to a bird or butterfly, 

As in the humblest dwelling of the dale 
A gracious welcome ’s shown the passer-by 
But evermore clear 
Allwhere I hear 

The calling of my native hut and sky. 

Land of my birth! a handful of thy sod 
Resuscitates the flower of my faith; 

For whatsoever the seer of science saylh, 
Thou art the cradle and the tomb of God; 
And forever I behold 
A vision old 

Of Beauty weeping where He once hath trod. 


LEBANUS 


To B. C. R . 

O my Love, how long wilt thou continue 
Fondly nursing every dreaming Hour! 

Our Lebanus, O my Love, is calling. 

Yea, and waiting in his ancient Tower. 

In his ancient, cedar-shaded castle, 

Night and day, Lebanus sits a-musing 
Of the memories that bloom unnoticed 
Every season at the feet of Sorrow;— 
Musing of the radiant days of Tammuz 
That went dancing with the bride of summer 
Down the deep and pine-encircled Wadi;— 
Musing of the time the Prophets kindled 
Sacred fire in Man’s empurpled temples, 
Blazing all the highways of the world;— 
Musing of the days embattled monarchs 
Laid their shields and lances at his feet, 
Bowed before his throne invincible. 

O my Love, the sad and lonely Cedar, 

Ever rocking in her arid splendor, 

Ever in penurious shades embosomed, 

Reaches out for water in the meadows 


43 


And for sunlight in deserted vineyards;— 

Rears her hope above the snow eternal 
Crowning her Time-hallowed desolation. 

O my Love, the crumbling Temple ’s dreaming 
Of the star that wanders from its orbit. 

Of the rose that blooms and dies forsaken, 

Of the leaves that fall from sheltering branches 
Only to become the sport of chance winds 
Or the bed of some unsightly creeper;— 
Dreaming of the Lebanon lily, drooping 
In the dells beneath forbidding ridges;— 
Dreaming of the corymbs of the elder 
That forgot the touch of loving hands, 

For the zephyr of the South, which passes 
O’er their bloom of tender welcome, only 
Fans into a flame the smoldering embers 
Of the anguish of departed lovers. 

O my Love, the furzes are in full bloom 
Waiting on the terrace of Lebanus 
For the ardent and enamored seeker,— 

Waiting, and the secret of their silence 
Locked remains within their shells of amber 
Till thou comest, till they hear thee whisper, 

I am thine and thou art mine forever. 

O my Love, how long wilt hither tarry, 

Making toys of Time’s discarded hours? 

Fair Lebanus, O my Love, is calling, 

Yea, and waiting in his House of Flowers. 
44 


And around it wings of song unnumbered, 
Amber-tinted, beryline, vermilion, 

Pour their riches in the land of mourning, 
Strew their silver in the olive grove, 

Weave their magic through the almond blossoms, 
Shake the incense from the terebinths, 

Spread in vain their gladness o’er the pines. 
Yea, a sea of Siren witchery, 

Like the sundown inundates the heaven, 

Rolling o’er a sea of boughs emblossomed, 
Multi-hued, aglow with burning rapture;— 

Waves of song are on the scented breezes, 
Rolling o’er the virgin snow of Sanneen, 

O’er the trackless verdure of the lowland, 

O’er the mottled mountains joined forever 
In a wild embrace of stony silence;— 

Rolling over Wadis fondly nursing 
Cyclamens of unremembered seasons, 

Oleanders of unfathered beauty, 

Irises of mothered tenderness. 

Yea, my Love, the robin in the olives 
Thrills the very shadow’ of the branch; 

In the pomegranate, thrush and skylark 
Fill its crimson cups with flaming rapture; 

In the fig tree and the laden vineyard, 

Bulbuls chant the joy of harvest-time. 

Yea, my Love, the birds of dawn are calling, 
Whispering, chattering, warbling everywhere, 
Dancing, flitting, waiting in the groves, 

'45 


Lingering in the chinks of terraces. 

Making early visits to their young. 

Nay, they’re busy making preparation 
For thy coming, longing to behold thee, 

Singing meanwhile to the morning star, 

Which borrows from thine eyes its radiance. 

From thy tresses, all its golden splendor. 

O my Love, how long wilt hither tarry, 

Wilt dally with the web of Time, how long? 
Lone Lebamts, O my Love, is calling, 

Yea, and waiting in his House of Song. 

And over it our star is re-appearing! 

The star of our own destiny is rising 
O’er the mountains of embrace eternal, 

O’er the cedars of the sacred faith, 

O’er the ruins of the ancient temple, 

Flooding them with light of tender pallor 
Like the light that lingers in the eyes 
Of parted lovers,—shaking from the bosom 
Of night their shadows, dew-drenched, iris-scented. 
Garlanding the messengers of morning 
For the coming of the well-loved stranger. 

Yea, the Star of Love, the Light supernal, 

Before which bowed the world in adoration. 

Is re-appearing in the Orient heaven 
For thy sake, for thee, O my Beloved. 

Yea, without thee, neither song nor flower 

46 


Nor star nor temple of antique Lebanus, 

Has aught compelling of the Soul’s devotion. 
But with thee, the caves, the naked ridges, 
The very rocks betoken the divine. 

O my Love, how long wilt hither tarry 
Weaving gossamer of day and night? 
Sad Lebanus, O my Love, is calling, 

Yea, and waiting in his House of Light. 


47 


THE PAGAN 


I walked into her Temple, as of yore 
My Tyrian sires, allured by cryptic signs; 

But sudden as I entered closed the door 
Upon the hope that mortal love resigns 
Before her ancient, myrtle-bowered shrines. 

I sorrowed not; though every lamp I lit 
Flamed up in speech articulate and said, 

Beware, O foolish Worshipper! ’t is writ: 

“Who craves a gift shall give his soul instead, 
Who lights a lamp is cursed of the dead.” 

I did not heed; I passed from shrine to shrine, 
Filling the lamps with oil, the Fane with light; 

But when I approached, O One Eternal, thine, 

I heard the terror of her tongue, and Night 
Was creeping on her brow of malachite. 

I did not stop, although the votive oil 
I poured into thine urn to water turned; 

But when the Dawn her enchantments came to foil, 
The secret of thy clemency I learned— 

Again the oil upon thine altar burned. 

48 


Then suddenly the Temple shook and swayed, 
And all the shrines, except thine, disappeared; 
Even so her heart, by knowledge undismayed, 

On Love’s one altar with thy hand upreared, 

To Love’s one God is evermore endeared. 


49 


THE LOST DISCIPLE 


O Master, I can not adventure with thee; 

At the Door of the Dawn, in my lone wandering, 

I have broken my staff; for the true dawn is she 
Who comes every day with her jar to the spring. 

Ay, Master, I tarried last night at the gate 
Of her garden, which kisses the Lake Galilee; 

She was gathering flowers and fruits for the Fete, 
And with tulips and poppies she beckoned to me. 

In her lamp there was oil, in my hand there was fire; 
In her house cried a voice, ‘O make haste with the 
flame!’ 

On my lips were the names of the daughters of Tyre, 
On her breast were the lilies that whispered thy 
name. 

I have dared, O my Master, to envy thy feet, 

And to yearn for the love of a Magdalen fair; 

I have dreamed that mine, too, in the heart of the 
street. 

Were laved with her own hands and dried with her 
hair. 


50 


O Master, my lips her devotion have stained, 

For her soul’s precious ointments were offered too 
late; 

I have lost in the fire of my lust what I gained 
In my longing and love for her love and thy fate. 


FROM THE ARABIC 


Why art thou so hushed and sad, 

So thin and wan? 

Who robbed thee of thy flesh and song,— 
Was it Ramadhan? 

Nay, Ramadhan is not to blame, 

For I have ceased to fast and pray; 
But to my vacant Dwelling came 
An unknown Guest—he came to stay. 

And in my heart he eats and drinks; 

He drinks my blood, of wines the best, 
And eats my burning flesh—ah, yes, 

My love for Zahra is that Guest. 


52 


SHE WENT OUT SINGING 


She went out singing, and the poppies still 
Crowd round her door awaiting her return; 
She went out dancing, and the doleful rill 
Lingers beneath her walls her news to learn. 

Their love is but a seed of what she has sown; 
Their grief is but a shadow of my own. 

O Tomb, O Tomb! did Zahra’s beauty fade, 

Or dost thou still preserve it in thy gloom? 

O Tomb, thou art nor firmament nor glade, 

Yet in thee shines the moon and lilies bloom. 




53 


HANEM 


Hanem, we must have met before, 

Perhaps a thousand years ago; 

I still remember when I tore 
Your virgin veil of lunar snow. 

By Allah, I remember, too, 

When, sousing in my mortal bain, 

You bit my lip and said, “Adieu, 

When shall we, Syrian, meet again?” 

Planem, thine eyes are brighter far 

Than when in mine they shone one day; 

I wager every moon and star 
The tax of lustre to them pay. 

And those who dared with them to jest, 
Where are they now ?—those lovers slain 

Who whispered dying on your breast, 

“O Hanem, shall we meet again?” 

The victims of your eyes are here, 

In pyramids they keep their clay; 

And even your sister Flames are near,- 
They fain would kiss my soul away. 

Full many a time from them you bore 
This mortal love, this mortal gain; 

Remember Nubia’s sable shore— 

When shall we, Hanem, meet again? 


54 


L’ Envoi 

Why quickly through the Cairo street?— 
Will you return?—Shall I remain? 

Fate might not ever the chance repeat; 
When shall we, Hanem, meet again? 


S3 


O FREEDOM 


O Freedom, in thy cause I fought, 

For twenty years I fought in vain; 

And in my mountain shelter naught 
But worthless trophies now remain. 

Yet in my heart I hear a cry, 

Which never there makes a vain appeal 

I would once more beneath thy sky 
Brandish my sharp and shining steel. 

How much one stakes upon thy dream, 
How much for but thy name we pay; 

How cheap the passing ages seem, 

When years are given for thy day. 

How many still would fight and die 
In thine old cause and for thy weal! 

I would once more beneath thy sky 
Brandish my sharp and shining steel. 

The purest love I give away, 

The bliss of it I set at naught; 

Again I’m on my wayward way 
Seeking what I have often sought. 

My wounded hopes, my bleeding ties, 

No peace inglorious e’er shall heal: 

I would once more beneath thy skies 
Brandish my sharp and shining steel. 

56 


L’Envoi 


O Freedom, though thy price be high, 
Though one for thee his life must seal, 
I would once more beneath thy sky 
Brandish my sharp and shining steel. 


57 


THE ROAD OF MAKE-BELIEVE 


1 

She sits upon a rock along the stream 
That heard the whisper of her first Desire, 
Washing the faded garment of her Dream, 

Which she had often carried to the Dyer— 

The Dream of her self-centred lyric fire. 

And in the flowing, scarlet wounds of Twilight, 
Expiring on Aurora’s drooping wings 
Beneath the secret scimitar of Night, 

She dyes again her garment, while she sings 
Of new-born love, though to self-love she clings. 

II 

He seeks the path of glory in the noon 
Of self-intoxication, dreaming still 
Of power,—wondering why the sun and moon 
Are not yoked to the chariot of his will. 

His soul, a clinging vine, his mind, an ill, 

He beats against the peaks of earth-bound dreams. 
Subsisting on the thistles of his heart, 

But ever seeking, in the fitful gleams 
Of his own fire, self-admiration’s mart 
To mend his horn or whet his venomed dart. 

58 


Ill 


They walk together in the golden vast 
Of vision-haunted, soul-alluring sands. 

Beholding the illusions of the past 
Among the ruins of deserted lands;— 

Together, although neither understands 
The groping purpose of the other; and yet, 

While in their hearts the gods of conflict nod, 
They gloze and smile, dissembling their regret: 
Love, on the Road of Make-Believe, they prod, 
He going to the dogs and she, to God. 




59 


RENUNCIATION 


At eventide the Pilgrim came 

And knocked at the Beloved’s door. 

“Whose there!” a voice within, “Thy name?” 

“ ’T is I,” he said.—“Then knock no more. 

As well ask thou a lodging of the sea,— 

There is no room herein for thee and me.” 

The Pilgrim went again his way 
And dwelt with Love upon the shore 
Of self-oblivion; and one day 
He knocked again at the Beloved’s door. 

“Whose there?”—“It is thyself,” he now replied, 
And suddenly the door was opened wide. 


60 


A SUFI SONG 


My heart ’s the field I sow for thee, 

For thee to water and to reap; 

My heart ’s the house I ope for thee, 
For thee to air and dust and sweep; 

My heart ’s the rug I spread for thee, 
For thee to dance or pray or sleep; 

My heart ’s the pearls I thread for thee, 
For thee to wear or break or keep; 

My heart ’s a sack of magic things— 
Magic carpets, caps and rings— 

To bring thee treasures from afar 
And from the Deep. 


6l 


THE TWO BROTHERS 


In the grotto the forest designed, 

Where the fire-fly first dreamed of the sun 
And the cricket first chirped to the blind 
Zoophyte,—in the cave of the mind 
We were born and our cradle is one. 

We are brothers : together we dwelt 
Unknown and unheard and unseen 
For aeons; together we felt 
The urge of the forces that melt 
The rocks into willowy^ green. 

For aeons together we drifted 
In the molten abysses of flame, 

While the Cycles our heritage sifted 
From the vapor and ooze, and uplifted 
The image that now bears our name. 

I am God: thou art Man: but the light 
That mothers the planets, the sea 
Of star-dust that roofs every height 
Of the Universe, the gulfs of the night,— 
They are surging in thee as in me. 


“I have tried to embody in these stanzas the idea, 
shared partly by the Sufi, that God and the Universe 
are one. 


62 



But out of the Chaos, to lead us, 

The Giants that borrow our eyes 
And lend us their shoulders, must heed us;— 
They yield us their purpose, they deed us 
Forever the worlds and the skies. 


63 


GOD OF THE DISTANCES, HEAR US 


I 

God of the Distances, hear us— 

Hear us and guide us today. 

Thy footsteps, though never so near us, 
Are lost in the dust of the fray. 

Thy high priests, who often have spoken 
The word that was heeded, are mute; 
Their torch is extinguished; their token 
Is distrust and discord and dispute. 

God of the Distances, never 
Was man, though still fettered, so free 
To challenge his star and to sever 
Himself from the past and from thee. 
But we, though our spirit is broken, 

We heed thee again and anon; 

We trust thee, O God, though thy token 
Be the desert, thy promise, the sun. 
Forever the Distances call us— 

The Distances veiled of the Dream; 

And we come, whatsoever befall us, 

Our pledges and thine to redeem. 

We come; and though often we altered 
Our course at the gates of dismay, 

We never looked backward or faltered. 
Never regretted our way. 

64 


God of the Distances, hear us— 

Hear us and guide us today. 

II 

From the cave of the first Dream we wandered 
Through the forests of Fate and of Chance; 

And on many an illusion we squandered 
The treasures of Faith and Romance. 

We fared with the Fairies of noontide, 

We roved with the Jinn of the night; 

Our high priests we left on the wayside, 

Our prophets we lost on the height 
Of rebellion recurrent. We passed 
Many a temple and shrine, 

Where the sherds of old creeds were recast 
And traded as tokens divine. 

We passed them, forever consoled 
And cajoled by the Voice,—’T is the way 
Of your goal; your forebodings allay.” 

But thousands of cycles we told, 

Millions of leagues we unrolled, 

Heedless of Time and his sway. 

God of the visions of old, 

Hear us and guide us today. 

III 

We sailed all the Seas of the Mind, 

VVe rounded the Capes of the Soul, 

65 


We crossed all the Channels that roll 
Over the dead of our kind. 

And on many a beckoning strand. 
Furrowed with silvery streams. 

We lingered, but lo, in the land 
Were the desolate gardens of dreams.— 
Onward! the sails of Desire, 

Born of the Distances’ fire, 

Tattered but ever unfurled, 

To worlds undiscovered aspire— 

To the life-giving worlds of our world. 
Onward! though no signs appear 
Where once rose the phares of the Seer 
And the Prophet. On, on! to the goal, 
Though veiled in the billows that roll 
Over Orion.—The fear 
Of the Distances never was liege 
Of our hearts; but the Mazes besiege 
The bridges of Faith on our way. 

God of our vision austere. 

Hear us and guide us today. 


Hear us the Captains of Sorrow,— 

The tillers of the soil of defeat,— 

The lights of the oft promised morrow, 
Whose false dawns thy promise repeat. 

66 


Our name and our purpose are written 
In blood on the tablets of Time; 

Our spirit, though frequently smitten 
To the dust, has arisen, sublime 
And triumphant, again and again; 

Our torch, though extinguished, was never 
Relinquished; our sword and our pen 
Are brandished forever and ever. 

Yea, the Ideal’s undying desire 

And the wreaths of defeat it has won, 

Their story, in letters of fire, 

Is limned on the brow of the sun. 

And not till a new world ’s begotten 
Of the womb of our own, will the word 
Of the soul of the earth be forgotten, 

Or the cry of the earth be unheard. 

T is our word, ’t is our cry, 't is our yearning. 
Which shall mark even the ending of Time; 
For no cycle of darkness returning 
Shall reach to the path we must climb, 

Or efface from our sight the supernal 
Eeauty of Truth born of Dream. 

God of the vision eternal, 

We are thine, though in darkness we seem, 

But hear us, O hear us today 
And help us again to our way. 


67 


BADRUDDIN 


Seek what you shall e’er possess, 

O Badruddin, 

Although it be a will-o’-the-wisp 
Of the Unseen, 

Which you may never behold 
Until my suns and satellites are cold. 

And in the seeking you shall find 

The hidden jewels of the soul and mind: 

And every jewel shall reveal 
Things divine 

Even in a Sufi’s logic wheel, 

Yea, even in the lowing kine. 

The eyewash, O lone Badruddin, I bring 
Is of the first dews of the first-born spring. 

Apply it and behold! 

Your dog-bitten sandals are transformed into gold; 
Your staff, sand-eaten and far-wandering, 

Is bursting into foliage, blossoming, 

Bearing fruits of wondrous lush and glow; 

And underneath the heavy-laden tree 
A maid, whose face dispels all human woe, 

Is cooking sesame for you and me. 

68 


Cast off the garments of the world 
And wear the sacred shades, 

Whose color of contentment never fades, 
And sit beside me with the golden fawn, 
Whose name is Eternal Dawn. 


O thou Beloved, every word of thine 
Is like a draught of purple wine; 

Every syllable 

Is like the singing of the bulbul. 

More potent are they than the magic lore 
Which to the blind the sight restore, 

As now to one, who though a pilgrim old, 

Is but an infant in the cradle of love. 

Yea, O thou incomparably Sweet, 

Thy words are to mine eyes a healing kohl, 

Alusk to my nostrils, balm to my soul, 

Strengthening ointments to my feet. 

And what, in the stores and treasures of the world, 
Is equal unto this? 

Wealth and Beauty, Fame and Power, 

They are but mirages in the boundless waste 
That separates me from thee—for an hour. 


Once I tarried at a Well in an Oasis fair 
But in the cup I lifted to my lips 
I saw the image of thy wrath 
And my despair:— 


69 


I dashed against a rock the common clay 
And hastened away. 

Now, O thou Beloved, I come to thee: 

With thy beauty drunk and dumb; 

Burdened with thy wealth, and lame; 

Ushered by thy liveried Fame; 

In thy glory garbed I come. 

But I tremble at thy threshold lest the thorns in my feet 
The story of my sacrifice repeat; 

I tremble at thy threshold lest the flowers of my heart 
Betray the painted lips of conscious art; 

I tremble at thy threshold lest the eyes 

That long have sought to behold but once thy face, 

Deserve not even thy shadow to embrace. 


70 


THE SUFI 


Lulled in the purple darkness is my soul, 
Behind the curtain, Allah, of my sight. 

Where recreative waves of wonder roll 
From sad seas of color over dead seas of light 
I close my eyes and lo, the laden Night 
Stops at the ivory gate to pay thy toll 
To my soul. 

And with it Wealth in Destitution’s van, 

And power in the chariot of Dole, 

And Fame upon the skeleton she stole 
From Death, Ambition, too, amidst her clan, 
Spurring her jaded nag:—the Caravan 
Of Life is at the gate to pay thy toll 
To my soul. 

They pass : I open my eyes: and as I try 
To con the cruel pages of the scroll 
Which Censure left in fragments at their goal 
Then suddenly, illumining the sky, 

A form of grace and beauty I descry. 

T is Love, O Allah, come to pay thy toll 
To my soul. 

7l 


But once, while lingering in the doleful shades, 
Among the fallen, wine-stained colonnades 
Of what was once thy temple, where still troll, 
With languid step, the spirit of pagan maids, 

I saw thee, Allah, coming through the glades 
With food of love and from thy scrip I stole 
A jasmine for my hungry soul. 


72 



THE FUGITIVE 

I saw Thee following me, 

I heard Thee calling me, 

I even felt Thine arrows in my tears; 
I know Thou art shadowing me, 

And wilt yet, forestalling me, 

Whip out the vanities of all my years. 

I ran and still I run away from Thee 
Through maze and mirage of mortality;— 
Over the hot sands and the frozen lakes, 
Across the sable wilderness that breaks 
In fragrant moors, I ran to hills of dreams, 

Up to the secret borderland that gleams 
Eternally, casting its shafts of light, 

From every incommunicable height, 

Upon the spinning feet of humankind. 


73 


O, how I leaped from peak to peak to find 
The path to the azure dance-hall of the world. 

Whose dome is gemmed, whose portals are empcarled 
With hearts that melt and crystallize and shine,— 
With frozen music, frozen beads of wine,— 

And whose laughter echoes through the spinning 
spheres, 

Where we were taught to dance in former years. 
Yea, I, who lit Thine altar, as a boy, 

And nursed in incense fumes my vision of joy, 

And like a roebuck leaped across the rills, 

And danced like sparks of sunlight o’er the hills, 

To be, at early morn and eventide, 

The first of acolytes that served with pride 
Thy venerable priests, alas! one day, 

Casting my shame and piety aside, 

I snuffed the candles out and walked away 
Into the dazzling night of dance and song, 

Into the temple of the merry throng. 

And ever since, a fugitive from Thee, 

Shod with Thy lightning, chuckling oft with glee, 
Unburdened and unfettered and undaunted, 

With naught, not e’en my shamelessness to hide. 
And only by beguiling Beauty haunted, 

I trod the path of demiurgic pride. 

Yea, I was proud, when in the dawn’s desire 
I could command the fruit of every tree, 

The bloom of every garden, and the fire 
Of every passion, every eestacy 


Upon my way. 0 pride of brawn and dare! 

I’d shake the lustre from the stars and steal 
The sap from the vines of June, and I would share 
My booty with the comrade that would seal 
His thieving faith with paeons to the deed 
That knows nor law, nor moral code, nor creed. 

II 

I ran and still I run away from Thee, 

Past pyramids and labyrinths of reason, 

Through gleaming forests, where the upas tree 
Feeds both the saint and sinner for a season. 

And I danced in its lethal shades; I climbed 
Up to the highest fruit-concealing bough 
That bends beneath a mocking wing; I rhymed 
My joy and pride; and o’er the very brow 
Of Death I leaped into the howling void, 

Where the acrobats of Mind, with balance-pole 
Of Logic in their hands, are ever employed 
In scanning the dark canyons of the Soul. 

And I was proud when on the tight rope I 
Essayed my feet and fixed my giddy brain 
Upon the universe; whereat the sky 
Was but a mute infinity of vain 
Belief; and every mystery divine, 

A sea-washed, iridescent hollow shell 
Upon the sands of faith: yea, every sign 
Upon the road led to an empty well. 

75 


And I was proud—O pride of intellect!— 

That the nothingness of things I could detect. 

Ill 

I ran and still I run away from Thee, 

Mistaking Thy compassion for Thine ire;— 

A rebel I, fantastically free, 

A green-eyed flame of crepitating fire 
Whipped by the winds of Circumstance, and yet 
By Thee pursued and by Thy love beset. 

And why?—I oft pretend to know not why 
This fond solicitude. For what am I 
But a bubble of vanity, a human thing 
Puffed with the vision of a loneliness 
In which a pimpled Ego tries to sing 
Of Self, alas! and spread its ebon wing. 

But I remember still Thy first caress, 

Which, in my infant vision I could feel 
Even as the flowers, which Thy love reveal, 

Even as the ocean in the Moon’s embrace, 

Even as the sunrise that reflects Thy face. 

And this remembering, I hailed the soul, 
Flaunting the sacred symbol of the goal 
That shrines Thine image; yea, and I was proud 
That, rising over Self Thyself to find, 

With Thine own godliness I was endowed, 

And yet I am but partially resigned. 

O, spiritual pride! which would disguise 

76 



The hollow heart of Holier-than-thou 
In accents borrowed from the meek and wise, 

I, too, have prated with a placid brow, 

Though I, still casting shadows in the mire, 
Was but a scarecrow in the vineyard of desire. 


I saw Thee following me, 

I heard Thee calling me, 

I even felt Thine arrows in my tears; 
I know Thou art shadowing me, 

And wilt yet, forestalling me, 

Whip out the vanities of all my years. 


// 


A CHANT OF MYSTICS 


I 

From the Mist of Arcana we rise. 

Through the Universe of Secrets we corr.e, 

And we enter the Tavern as Lovers, 

Whose features are pale as the false dawn, 

Whose statures are lean as the new moon. 

Like unto a jar is the body, 

And the soul in the jar 

Is the silvery voice of the Fountain, 

Is the rose-scented breath of the Mountain, 

For your sake we have come 

In the shape of a jar from the Sea; 
For your sake we have come as Disgrace, 
But glory incarnate are we. 

For the sake of the world we dance 
O’er the flame, on the point of the lance. 

O, think us not mortal, for we 
Are the light on the foam of the sea. 

Of a truth, we are kin to the sun, 

The infinite source of all splendors; 

We are one 


78 


With the world’s riddles and wonders. 

But not of the world nor the sun is the breath 
That lingers awhile in the regions of Death. 

The dust on our sandals betrays us, we know— 

We have travelled afar our devotion to show 
To him who is waiting for us at the gate 
Of the Garden of Union our longing to sate. 

We shall interpret the Truth, 

We shall the Secret unveil; 

For naked we come, like the dew, 

Like the zephyr, we come, and the gale: 
Naked, through thorn-bush and grass, 

We speak add we pass. 

Our garments were burned in the fire of the Mind, 
In the world where the Deaf still dispute with the 
Blind. 

We are the Truth, 

And into the world 

From the Universe of Secrets we’re hurled. 

W r e are the Truth, 

And into the skies 

From the Mists of Arcana we rise. 

II 

In the light of the day, in the stars of the night we 
behold 

The face of the Master, the feet of the Pilgrim of old; 

79 



In the sigh of the wind and the voice of the thunder 
we hear 

The plaint of the bard and the rhapsodic chant of the 
seer. 

Without them, alas, we are dumb, 

Though not deaf to the flute and the drum. 

But the vision is true, 

Allahu, Allahu! 

They are garbed in blue, 

Allahu, Allahu! 

They are drenched with dew, 

Allahu, Allahu! 

Hail, Sana’i a the Moon of the Soul, 

The Guide and the Road to the goal. 

Hail, Attar 8 the Vezier of Birds, 

Who sing in his musk-scented words. 

Hail, Arabi, b the Tongue of the Truth, 

The Eye of the Prophet, in sooth. 

Hail, Rabi’a, 8 the Heart of the Sphere, 

Beloved of the bard and the seer; 

The Rosebud that rises to greet 
The splendor beneath Allah’s feet. 

Hail, Gazzali, b the Weaver of Light, 

The maker of wings for the flight. 

Hail, Hallaj, b the Diver divine, 

W'hose pearls decorate every shrine, 


“Famous Sufi poets of Persia. 

b Sufi philosophers and poets of Arabia. 

80 



Whose blood was the pledge that his words, 
/ am Truth, shall fore’er be a sign. 

To Jelal’ud-Din Rumi,* all hail! 

The Master who flung every veil 
To the wind, who ne'er sober was seen, 
Though ne’er to the tavern had been; 

But ever—and often alone— 

Was dancing before Allah’s throne. 

Hail, Tabrizi, a who nourished the Bard 
With jasmine and myrtle and nard;— 

Who loafed and invited his soul 

And would not write a word in his Scroll. 

Hail, Fared, 1 ’ the love-stricken one, 

The heart of the rhapsodic Sun; 

The soul of the Vineyard, the Press 
That knew every vineyard’s caress: 

The host of the Tavern divine— 

The Saki, the Cup, and the Wine. 

The vision is true, 

Allahu, Allahu! 

They are garbed in blue, 
Allahu, Allahu. 

They are drenched with dew, 
Allahu, Allahu! 


“Famous Sufi poets of Persia. 
b The foremost Sufi poet of Arabia. 

81 




And casting the years from their folds and the 
shame 

From their bosoms, they leap in the circle of flame; 
They leap, with a flash of their limbs, to the dance 
In the tender caress of the Beautiful’s glance. 

For only in rapture the face of Beloved is seen 
Through the mask of the spheres and the veils of 
existence terrene; 

And only the slaves of Devotion and Love have the feet 
That dare to approach the enravishing glow of the 
Screen. 

Yea, hither we come as the flame of his rapturous fire, 
And to the music of rebec and flute, in the dance, we 
expire. 


Ill 


Yea, Man is as near the Beloved 
As far from the world he may be; 

He is full of the beauty of Allah 
As he’s void of the Thou and the Me. 
Life and the world we abandon 
That the Life of the world we may see. 
O, come to the assembly of Lovers 
In the shade of the Tuba tree. 

O, come to the Banquet of Union 
And taste of the ecstasy. 

O, come to the Tavern where nectar 
82 


And wine are a-flow as the sea. 

For only the drunken are sober, 

And only the fettered are free. 

Like the waves of the ocean we rise and we melt into 
foam 

That the Moon’s caravan might carry us back to our 
home. 

Likes the motes in the sun-beam we dance in the dawn’s 
disarray 

That the sun might preserve us awhile from dust and 
decay; 

But the atoms of being, the motes in the Sun of his 
Love, 

Are aflame with desire to be where no night is nor day. 

Like a child in the cradle whose mother must rock it 
to sleep, 

We rock to and fro that the child of our heart might 
be still; 

Like the lonely palm, when the whirlwinds over it 
sweep, 

We sigh and vvc chafe in our chains, and we bow to 
his will. 

Like the bird in the cage who pecks at his sugar and 
sings, 

So we, in the Cage of the world, to quiet our wings. 

But the vulgar will say that the dance of the palm ’s 
to the wind, 


83 



And the bird to the sugar is singing—Alas! for the 
blind! 

We come for their sake in the shape of a jar from the 
Sea; 

We are filled with the water that heals; and though 
sealed, we are free. 

Nor Crescent Nor Cross we adore; 

Nor Budha nor Christ we implore; 

Nor Muslem nor Jew we abhor: 

We are free. 

We are not of Iran or of Ind, 

We are not of Arabia or Sind: 

We are free. 

We are not of the East or the West; 

No boundaries exist in our breast: 

We are free. 

We are not made of dust or of dew; 

We are not of the earth or the blue: 

We are free. 

We are not wrought of fire or of foam; 

Nor the sun nor the sea is our home; 

Nor the angel our kin nor the gnome: 

We are free. 


84 


Yea, beyond all the moons and the suns ^ud the stars, 
in a place 

Where no shadow of horizon is, nor of darKness a 
trace, 

Where the Garden of God is a-bloom on Love’s radiant 
strand, 

There is our temple, our home, and our own native 
land. 

Yea, body and soul to the world and the sun do we 
give, 

And in the First Soul—the Soul of Beloved—eternally 
live. 

IV 

Awake, O ye Pilgrims, awake! 

O Lovers, arise and prepare! 

The drum of departure we hear; 

The Driver is come for the fare. 

The camels are ready; their bells 
Are decking with silver the air. 

Awake, O ye Pilgrims, awake! 

O Lovers, arise and prepare! 

The nightingale sings on the branch 
To wake up the blossoms; the creek 
Whispers a word to the fern, 

Who follows, his favor to seek; 

The tulip is begging to go 

With the zephyr who kisses her cheek; 

85 


The face of the Mist is a-glow, 

For Dawn mounts the Minaret to speak: 
Open the v road is, and safe ; 

No gates and no sentries are there ; 
Awake, O ye Pilgrims, aivake! 

O Lovers, arise and prepare! 


Each moment a spirit is sent 

With a message of mystery sealed; 

Each moment a spirit goes forth 
That the mystery might be revealed. 

And whenever the Dawn opes his eyes, 

A blind one on the wayfare is healed; 

Whenever a Lover appears, 

The Night drops her star-studded shield; 

Whenever a Lover is slain, 

Blooms a flower in the world’s barley field. 

And always the pangs of departure 
Are wrought into torches that flare. 

Awake, O ye Pilgrims, awake! 

O Lovers, arise and prepare. 


Ere the saki was born, ere the vineyard existed, 

The cup, bright and brimful, enchanted our eyne; 
Ere the tavern was built, we revelled and trysted 
With the loved One and drank to his beauty divine. 
We drink till we wander away from Self and Desire,— 
We drink till in drunkenness we, on his bosom, expire. 
86 


We have known long ago all the raptures of madness; 

All the raptures of burning from childhood we know; 

In our soul is the soul of the Mother of gladness; 

In our heart is the heart of the Father of woe. 

Transported and smitten, we wander with ne’er a 
complaint; 

Our story entrances the sinner, enraptures the saint. 

Transported and smitten and drunk, we are thought 
to be mad; 

Self-abandoned, unity-seeking, we’re the puzzle of 
fools; 

For the madman’s madness is varied in art, and the 
sad 

Piety-monger tickles his heart while he drools. 

O, mind not the strings of our robe, they were loosed 
in the revel;— 

They snapped when we drank with the saint and 
danced with the devil. 


There is nothing that we would conceal in the seeking; 

Our love is the sun and our passion its flame; 

To dance-hall or tavern, we come not a-sneaking; 
For the right and the wrong of the world are the 
same. 

And if you are a seeker, the blood of Hypocrisy shed: 
Nor be trammeled by Shame—take a poniard and cut 
off her head. 


87 


For your sake we have come 

In the shape of a jar from the Sea; 

For your sake we have come as Disgrace. 

But glory incarnate are we. 

O think us not mortal, for we 
Are the light on the foam of the sea. 

Still higher our rank, though we come 
With the flute and the drum. 

In the veils of the world do we come 
With the flute and the drum. 

As vigilant warders we come 
With the flute and the drum. 

To call you to the Tavern we come 
With the flute and the drum. 


V 


Perchance in our sleep we become unaware 
Of the circumstance strange of our birth; 
Perchance a hair 

Divides the heaven and the earth. 

But whether two worlds or a hundred, the loved One 
is all; 

Only One do we seek, only One do we know, 

Only One do we hear, do we see, de we call. 

We come as the heroes and slaves of the Mighty, the 
Dear; 

We come as the mind and the soul of the violet Sphere. 

88 


What place have your meat and your bread 
Where we were first born, and first fed 
Through our eye and our ear? 

And now, without eyes we can see, 

Without tongues we can speak, 

Without ears we can hear. 

And when the clouds and the storms of the Mind 
Darken and shut out the skies, 

We kindle the torch of the Heart, 

Which we give to the mighty and wise. 

For the heart is the bird of a world made holy by song; 

’T is the love-lorn and love-guided bulbul the owls 
among. 

And when it wings all exultant its way over mountain 
and moor, 

It dreads nor the depths nor the heights nor the 
transcending lure. 

The heart is a treasure of gold in the dust-pit of things; 

’T is the rebec of love and of love forever it sings; 

’T is the pearl in the sea and the phare on the shore 
of the Mind; 

’T is the ear of the deaf and the all-seeing eye of the 
blind. 

The heart is the maker of dreams, the alembic of 
power: 

*T is the gate to all beauty, the key to the ivory tower; 

89 


’T is the crown of the Budha, the Christ, ’t is the 
sword of the Prophet; 

’T the flame in the temple of faith, and of reason, 
the flower. 


The heart is the last star that leaves in the wake of 
the Night, 

And the first star that ushers Aurora’s pageant of light; 

’T is the first and the last ray of hope, the salvation 
of man; 

’T is our guide and our standard—the leader of our 
caravan. 


Hearken! the voice of our leader 
In the dawn’s stillness and glow : 
Allahu, Allahu! We’re ready! 

Sight-seeing with us, who will go? 


The hour of departure is come, 

The caravan ’s moving. Woh ho! 

We are bound for a country of wonder. 
Sight-seeing with us, who will go? 


Wherever we stop on the way 

Is a feast for the heart, and a show; 
Everywhere, too, is a tavern, 
Sight-seeing with us, who will go? 


90 


He who has led us thus far 
Will lead us still further, we know : 

He opens to us every gate,- 

Sight-seeing with us, who will go? 

He is the magnet and we 

Are but pieces of steel: woh ho! 

Earthward the Magnet is moving!— 
Sight-seeing with us, who will go? 

Sweet scents from the curl of his tresses 
Are a-float on the breezes that blow 

From the radiant peaks of the world:— 
Sight-seeing with us, who will go? 

As we fix our amorous gaze 

Upon him more amorous we grow: 

He moves in a soul-witching maze:— 
Sight-seeing with us, who will go ? 

Come! but come empty of purse and empty of hand; 
Who travel with us shall not hunger or thirst, nor 
shall need; 

For the stores of the Master are open in every land, 
And his Stewards, the Earth and the Sun, his wishes 
exceed. 

He is our need, 

Our staff and our creed; 

9i 




Of our hope and despair, 

He’s the Sun and the Seed. 

Come, but come empty of heart and empty of mind; 
Who travel with us shall not carry a thought or a 
care; 

For they who all things abandon, everything find, 

And they who are drawn to the loved One, escape 
every snare. 

He is our care, 

Our goal and our snare; 

Of our grief and our joy, 

The bequeather and heir. 

VI 

Grape-juice must ferment in the jar, 

Ere it turns into wine; 

So the heart, in the jar of Desire, 

To sparkle and shine. 

Like the face of the mirror that ’s clear 
Of image and form, 

So the heart must be free e’en of shadows 
To reflect the divine. 

O Brothers, our words are the petals 
Of the rose that eternally blooms 

In the thornless rose-bush of the Soul, 

Which his image assumes. 


92 


O Brothers, our word is the truth, 

Our standard the guide; 

No Sufis are speaking, but he 
In whom all things abide. 

Yea, his parrots are we, sugar-chewing 
And repeating his words evermore, 

While the habitants rude of the world 
Camel-like thistles devour. 

Sugar-chewing we come for your sake; 
Awake, O ye Pilgrims, awake! 

The cypress that once graced the grove, 

Is a-float on the river of Love. 

O Lovers, the Veil of the Secret he rends, 

And like light drops of water, he gently descends. 

He walks on the face of the turbulent sea, 

Driving before him the waves to their lee; 

Like a shepherd he calls, and his flock turned to foam. 
Scurries and scampers, impatient for home. 

A moment, alas! When his face is revealed, 

All the wounds of the world are miraculously healed. 
A moment, alas! When his light disappears, 

The world is submerged in an ocean of tears. 

We are the light that is spun 
For the firefly and the sun; 

We are the thread in the pearls 
Of the sea and the tear. 


93 


Make use of our pearls, and our foam, and our fire; 
For your sake we have come as Disgrace from the 
Sea;— 

For your sake we have come in the flesh of Desire, 

But glory and beauty incarnate are we. 

We are the flowers in his Garden, the lights in his Hall, 
The sign on his Portal, but he, he is all,—he is all! 

The banquet, the host, and the guest,— 

The seeker, the sought, and the quest,— 

All three, 

Is he. 

The given, the taker, the giver,— 

Love, the beloved, the lover,— 

All three, 

Is he. 

And we, to rejoin him, like torrents, escape through the 
hills; 

No fetters, no-walls can restrain us, no welfare, no ills. 

Hope is sighing, 

Faith is crying, 

Creeds are dying,— 

Allah, Allah! 

A clap of thunder 
Rents asunder 
Man’s little Wonder,— 

Allah, Allah! 

94 


Idols tumble 
In a jumble, 

Temples crumble,—• 
Allah, Allah! 

Flames are sweeping ; 
Priests are reaping; 
Kings are weeping,—• 
Allah, Allah! 

Ashes cumber 
Flame and ember, 

Who remember— 
Allah, Allah! 

Night is crawling, 
Stars are falling, 
Souls are calling— 
Allah, Allah! 

Orbs are winging. 

Fire-bringing, 

And of him singing,— 
Allah, Allah! 

Clove and nard, in 
His first garden. 

Wait his pardon,— 
Allah, Allah! 

95 


Every flower 
In his bower 
Is Love’s dower,— 

Allah, Allah! 

His compassion 
And his passion 
Are our fashion,— 

Allah, Allah! 

Whirl, whirl, whirl, 

Till the world is the size of a pearl. 
Dance, dance, dance, 

Till the world ’s like the point of a lance. 
Soar, soar, soar, 

Till the world is no more. 


96 
















